Data management and reconciliation provider NeoXam has launched a dedicated team in the UK, bringing sales and servicing closer to UK clients to win more local business and strengthen its global footprint.
The French company, who’s software and technology helps companies oversee and manage more than 25 trillion euros of assets, has begun with a three-strong sales division in London and will complement that with support and technical expertise as the venture grows.
The move is designed to capture more business from a market that NeoXam has previously served from its Paris base. As well as focusing on UK banks and asset managers, the company hopes to capitalise on the growing UK FinTech sector, which has created more 40 unicorns in the past 20 years and accounts for a fifth of the nation’s financial services market value, according to data compiled by Boston Consulting Group.“We have a lot of clients whose headquarters are not in the UK but that have activity in the UK… but we want to start having local clients,” Charles Sayac, NeoXam Managing Director for EMEA told Data Management Insight at the initiative’s launch in London. He wouldn’t be drawn on the firms NeoXam is in discussion with.
Global Reach
NeoXam serves more than 150 customers in 21 countries, providing clients from both buy-side and sell-side, as well as asset owners and servicing companies, with data management and reconciliation capabilities through its NeoXam DataHub an NeoXam Aro products. It also offers portfolio management services through NeoXam PMS, while NeoXam GP is an investment accounting platform and NeoXam Impress provides investment reporting functionality.
The UK’s financial sector remains an attractive destination for data vendors and providers. It is still the world’s second-largest holder of assets and its institutional embrace of artificial intelligence has made it the second-most attractive destination for tech talent globally. That is helping to stanch a decline set in train during the global financial crisis and compounded by slowing productivity and business lost to European capitals after Brexit.
NeoXam’s UK plans were begun last year and have “accelerated” with the appointment of a sales team and the establishment of a pipeline of potential deals. Sayac said the team would be augmented with local hires once the “closing of the first opportunity” was achieved.
“The recruitment of professional services people… will be the second step,” he said.
Expansion Blueprint
NeoXam hopes to replicate its growth pattern in other geographies, such as Switzerland, Australia and Luxembourg, where the firm had strong business with international clients but fewer with locals firms.
“The idea is to have local people there, to accompany the expertise of our company,” said Sayac.
The company didn’t anticipate any regulatory hurdles to opening a UK office, he added. Instead, the country’s unique oversight regime – particularly the Financial Conduct Authority’s Consumer Composite Investments (CCI) – which become mandatory in June, would offer opportunities for NeoXam.
“CCI is a business driver for us because we think some of our solutions could be right to help our clients address this specific regulation,” he said.
Local Focus
Sayac is confident that NeoXam can win business from local companies now that it has a team on the ground, having previously served the country from its head office in Paris.
“We thought because we are very close to the UK, with our headquarters in Paris, that it was possible to do it from our head office but I think it’s not the case,” Sayac said. “We thought that naively that we could.”
He said managing UK clients from Paris was difficult because those customers wouldn’t always travel to France for critical meetings. It was decided that the UK needed a dedicated local focus, he added.
“It’s a specific market,” he said. “We learned in other markets that we can’t address the market if we are not physically there. And this is what we want to change. This is how we have been successful everywhere.”
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